No commercial contract yet but South Australia keen to export uranium to India
A uranium powerhouse, South Australia is currently in the throes of a debate on its involvement in nuclear fuel cycle but says this will have no impact on the agreement reached between India and Australia for supply of uranium to India.
South Australia accounts for over 80 per cent of the uranium reserves in Australia, the third largest producer in the world of `yellowcake’ which is crucial to India’s civil nuclear power programme. Despite the finalisation of administrative arrangements between India and Australia late last year for supply of uranium, there has been no shipment yet because of the absence of any commercial contract between India and the privately held uranium exporting companies in Australia.
South Australia’s visiting minister for trade and investment Martin Hamilton-Smith Monday said this was not because of a lack of interest in South Australia’s uranium industry and that the local government remained committed to facilitating sale of uranium to India.
“South Australia had set up a Royal Commission on nuclear fuel cycle and now we have gone to the public with its report for community consultations as it is important to seek people’s opinion,” said Hamilton-Smith.
“Even if the outcome of these consultations turn out to be negative, it will have no impact on sale of uranium to India,” he added.
The minister also said that South Australia was open to investments by Indian companies into a nuclear waste repository which the state is likely to build. This was one of the major recommendations by the Royal Commission report which was made public in May this year.
“The nuclear waste repository will entail investments worth billions of dollars and Indian companies can also get involved. This is not related to supply of uranium to India but it can certainly add value to India’s cooperation with Australia (in civil nuclear technology),” said Hamilton-Smith.
The Royal Commission report recommends that the South Australian government pursue the opportunity to establish used nuclear fuel and intermediate level waste storage and disposal facilities in the state.
The report also touches upon concerns expressed regularly in Australia about India not having signed NPT and CTBT and yet managing to secure agreement for uranium procurement from Australia.
“The reservations are largely founded on India’s non-membership of the NPT and Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), and the potential for the supply of uranium to create surplus capacity in a customer’s domestic stocks for use in weapons production. While these are legitimate concerns to hold, it is important for countries such as Australia to engage in diplomacy as a way of expanding the reach of global non-proliferation norms,” it says.
Russia and Canada, which have bilateral agreements with India for civil nuclear cooperation, are currently the 2 main suppliers of uranium to India which aims to shore up its nuclear power production capacity to 63,000 MW by 2032. The current capacity is 5780 MW. While Russia exported 345 tonnes of uranium to India in 2015-16, Canada supplied 250 tonnes during the same period.
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